The present invention relates in general to the field of automatic parking meters; more particularly it relates to apparatuses which enable regulating parking permits for short time-spans.
Most metropolitan areas deal with severe shortage in parking spaces, especially in the commercial districts during business hours. For this purpose many municipalities introduced the short-term parking zones in which drivers can park their cars for short time periods, ranging between ten minutes and half an hour. Existing solutions such as parking meters provide only a partial answer to the need to regulate parking in such zones since they do not prevent drivers from renewing or reactivating them sequentially, thereby exceeding the amount of time permitted for parking in the short term parking zone. There is therefore a need for a solution which would enable drivers to park in short-term parking zones but would ensure that they do not exceed the permitted parking time period.